My First Concert

On Friday night, I went to my first concert ever. I wasn't really excited about it since I didn't really listen to the band. I got tickets for free from a friend of mine, so I said, "Why not?" We went to see New Found Glory. I had only heard a few of their songs, and they didn't seem too terrible to me. When we got there, only a few small bands were playing. I wasn't very impressed since the bands weren't very popular at all. In fact, there were bands playing for their first time ever. There wasn't much to do there as a 16 year old, except sit around and talk to your friends. The real action started when the opener band started to play. That's when people started flooding into the main room. Since we were on the Marquette campus, the concert was filled with college kids. And knowing college kids, it was bound to be a party. It was packed, and I was very skeptical at first to jump into the crowd. It was only until New Found Glory started playing that I did, and I'll never forget it. It was back to back, shoulder to shoulder. The shoving was wild. I lost my shoe at least twice. People were crowd surfing and screaming their lungs out. My friend said to me, "Your turn!!" Next thing I knew I was surfing over hundreds of peoples hands to the front of the stage. It really was indescribable. The experience was amazing, and I hope to do it again sometime.

"Hello, have I met you before?"

Memory seems like such a complex and tricky idea. The depth to the concept seems endless. So, how does it work? Well, described in simple terms, it's actually not very complicated at all. Vlad Tarko describes it as, "The way memory functions can be described in the following way: When we are in a certain situation, certain things attract our attention and generate emotions, thoughts etc. When we are recalling something we revisit in our imagination that certain situation and the brain generates the same emotions, thoughts etc. once again (or maybe not exactly the same emotions and thoughts but some which resemble them fairly closely)." Basically, memory is not a file cabinet where your brain can just pick and choose memories to open. If you would like to read more about an experiment that has to do with memory and fMRI's, you can read this. To read a more in-depth article on how memory works, visit this link. Also, here is an article about photographic memory, or eidetic memory.

"Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind" is a movie where the process of being able to eliminate certain parts of your memory is available. They describe the process as destroying certain cells and neurons, or "a bad night of drinking". The movie revolved around a couple whose long, intimate relationship turned sour. The girl got every memory about her ex boyfriend and their relationship removed because she was in so much pain. If you could have this done to yourself, would you do it? I really don't think I would. Yes, the memories are painful, but pain is part of life. If you have every painful memory erased, you won't know how to deal with pain in the future. I really don't think there should be an option to have parts your memory erased. Memory and pain is part of life. Something can be learned from every bad thing that happens, so live with it, embrace it, and most importantly, learn from it.

Ugh, not another one!

Random nosebleeds may be one of the most inconvenient things ever. I mean you have to tilt your head back, stuff your nose with Kleenex, then go back and clean everything you dripped blood on. Recently, I've been getting nosebleed after another. Luckily, I don't faint at the sight of blood. Never in my life have I got so many in one week. I used to only get one or two nosebleeds a year! I can't even count the amount of nosebleeds I've gotten in the past month. So why do people get random nosebleeds? This website explains simply that dry air can be a main cause of random nosebleeds. Especially in winter when you crank up the heat and fill your house with dry, warm air.
The best way that I've found to stop nosebleeds is to just keep shoving tissue paper into your nose until it's stuffed, but this article gives you some better advice on how to stop them. Basically it tells you to sit down and lean slightly forward so your nose is above your heart. Squeeze the soft portion of your nose right under the bone, and lean forward so that the blood flows out your nose and not down your throat.
If you want to read a little more about nosebleeds, you can look here for some more basics facts about nosebleeds, how to stop them, and how to prevent them from happening in the future. I hope this helped if you're someone like me who gets nosebleeds and just can't stand them. Nobody likes nosebleeds, so take a quick peak at the articles. I'm sure they'll help!

The Radio You Control

Recently, my girlfriend showed me this amazing radio that I can control! I know, you're probably thinking, "What are you talking about...? I can control radios too." Well my radio knows what kind of music I like. I can throw out the bad songs so it never plays them again, and pick specific stations that focus around one genre of music. How, you might ask? Well Pandora Radio, probably the most amazing radio I have ever listened to, is just the right radio for you. Whether you like rap, country, hip hop, or heavy metal, Pandora will find you new music you've never heard of and will love. Each song you listen to has a thumbs up and a thumbs down you can click on. Pandora won't play songs you choose the thumbs down for again, and it'll try not to play music like it. If you choose the thumbs up, Pandora will play that song more, and try to find other music similar to it that that you'll like. It's a human genome project based on an internet radio station! It has preset stations, and stations you can create that start with your favorite artist or song, and slowly expand based on songs you give thumbs up to. I know this will be love at first sight, just take a look. Give Pandora a chance, I know you'll love it.

Burgers, Fries, Chips, and Soda

Do you remember the last meal you ate? If so, what was it composed of? After you've made a mental list of what you consumed, let me ask you, are there any fries on that list? Or hamburgers or hotdogs? Maybe some pizza and soda too? If there are, then have fed your body a plethora of waste that probably provided your body with more than the average of two meals of calories. You can find the 88 most unhealthy foods here. Just take a look at the list and ask yourself whether or not you've eaten any of these products designed and manufactured to meet the glorious needs of your taste buds. Feeding this disgusting, fake food into your body is just asking for an earlier than planned date with death. How can you take a bite into a bigmac, chicken strips, or shove a handful of fries into your mouth without imagining your arteries slowly clogging with every chew and swallow you make. Diets high in trans fat are famous for being the main cause of coronary heart disease, stroke, and diabetes. It can also cause cancer, obesity, liver dysfunction, and infertility. Do yourself a favor, stop eating junk. Come here for a quick guide on eating healthy.

Dreams

Have you ever woken up feeling like you were stepping into a new world or stepping back into your old one? Everybody has at some point in their lives. Dreams are a mystical thing of all sorts and ideas. Nobody can truly explain them. Some people say that a dream unifies the mind, spirit, and body. Many people try to unravel the meaning of dreams. An interesting place that attempts to analyze dreams is http://www.dreammoods.com. Even if you've woken up thinking you didn't dream that night, you did. Everybody dreams whether you believe it or not. It's just that some people remember their dreams more than others or not at all. Technically, according to Wikipedia, dreams are, "Dreams are sequence images, sounds and feelings experienced while sleeping, strongly associated with rapid eye movement." The scientific study of dreams is called Oneirology. You can find out more about it here and here. If you have any interest in why or how you dream, just visit any of the websites listed above. You do it every night, so shouldn't you learn a little about it?

Snowday!

Almost every student at GBN has been talking about snow days for the past week. "A snow day would save my life!" "Everyone! There's going to be a snow day tomorrow! Just don't come to school!" Of course there are also the few kids that run down the halls screaming, "SNOW DAY TOMORROW! WOOHOOO! NO SCHOOL!!!" It's too bad there usually isn't a snow day the next day. Oddly, there was one today. After all the hype and talk about it there finally was one. Students have been checking the weather almost everyday throughout the week hoping to see that glorious announcement of a 13 inch dump of snow overnight. The snow day was a perfect start to an early winter break. Everybody, even the teachers I'm sure, were dreading the last day of school. There's nothing better than a winter break, except a longer one. People were also saying that they didn't want a snow day because we would have to make up the day at the end of the year. First of all they are wrong because we can have up to 2 missed days before they start making it up. Secondly, sometimes a surprise day off is the best thing that can happen to a student or teacher. I'm sure most students would love to have a surprise 3 day weekend, even if they had to make up 1 extra day at the end of the year. For me this snow day is almost perfect. It has prevented me from having that 'last day of school' attitude and not wanting to do any work while also raising my spirits. All I can say is, "I love snow."